It is well established that Infra-red has many benefits to the human body and there are many clinics that use infra-red for treatment of aging process and its related complications. The problem is that infra-red cannot penetrate deep tissues. Thus, historically its main use for therapeutic purposes has been directed to skin and the very near subcutaneous tissues
Recently, the introduction of pulsed infra-red laser that can penetrate deeper tissues for approximately three inches has enabled the treatment of chronic pain. Moreover, some centres in the United States and Canada have claimed that pulsed infra-red laser treatment can successfully replace some surgical interventions in many painful and refractory diseases. Although this new advanced technique helps many patients, the skin still consumes about 50% of the beam energy so that tissues and structures deeper than three inches cannot get good benefit from the Pulsed IF therapy.
Thus, a need exists to provide infra-red radiation to deeper tissues/structures, e.g., the back of lumbar discs or a mid-femur fracture, with good concentration for viable therapeutic results and without damaging the skin, i.e., exceeding what is called the skin tolerance limit.
The subject invention addresses those needs.
The patent literature includes disclosures of some infra-red devices for treating some medical conditions by delivering the infra-red radiation through a cannula into the body of a patient. Examples of such prior art devices are shown in U.S. Published Patent App. Nos. 2012/0289859 (Nicoson et al.) and in European Patent App. No. EP 2 449 994.